In The Nick Of Time

Sometimes it takes a little Sunny Palace up on a hill to ease the pain and give a new beginning to everything life messed over.

Submitted:Mar 24, 2007
Reads: 177
Comments: 2
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Nine months ago, I was not alive. Sure I was a living,
breathing creature, and I still am, but I was dead spiritually.
Had I not decided to tear myself away from my life and all that I
knew, I would still be that dead person. If I had not come to
Sunny Palace, I would still be wreaking havoc around my town.

My life before Sunny Palace was one as dark as obsidian. I was
in with the wrong crowd and constantly in trouble at school. And
home posed no sort of comfort. My parents were never home and
could careless if I were breathing, as long as I made a decent
appearance at dinner parties. I suppose they are the reason I
turned to drugs. I was susceptible to peer-pressure and life
drained from me like water down a toilet bowl.

Though I smile on the outside, inside I was broken; dying. But
when I was on acid or pot all the disdain and fury fled from me.
The doctors here say drugs were my ways of seeking my parent's
attention. They say my obsequious behavior drove me to the false
security of joy, and had I not decided to separate myself from
the sycophancy, I would surely be dead.

The trips acid took me on were great. With the candy, the world
was colorful like the bijouterie of a queen, but without them,
the frabjous atmosphere faded away, and the world became gray and
fallacious. My parents would tell me everything was going to be
fine and that my life would lighten, but they were lies. Everyday
was the same as the last. I kept skipping school and hanging out
with the "cool" kids, smoking pot, and getting into things I
wasn't supposed to.

Slowly my life slipped away from me, trip by trip. The drugs
became encroaching leeches and soon after I begin taking them, my
suicide notes began to pour from the tip of my blood-red pen, one
after the other. Nothing in my life mattered to me; life didn't
even matter to me, not that it ever had. Each suicide attempt
failed me though. Every time I woke up alive, I felt abandoned by
the pills I had taken. There was no satisfaction for the pain I
felt inside. Life would not leave me.

Then one night, a near death experience opened up my eyes to
the truth. I was at a party and didn't realize I was eating
M&M's laced with acid, they tasted so good. I kept eating
them non-stop, until I got that familiar feeling of elation. The
hairs on my neck stood up, like the hackles of an animal as I
stood on the ledge of that bridge. The scruples of my
consciousness called out to me, but it was far too late for I
leaped from that high place.

Apparently there was ecstasy amongst the M&M's that night
as well. I just couldn't tell the difference, it all tasted so
swell. The doctors had to pump my stomach and hook me upto an
I.V. just to keep me from slipping into a coma. My parents
berated me for going to the party, not even caring that I nearly
killed myself. The very brunt of the water might have killed me
had it not been that the hood of my jacket caught on a nail,
catching me by the throat before I hit the water. But my parents
didn't care about that; they were only worried about their
reputations with their bosses, the neighbors, the country club.
They didn't care about me.

After that near death experience, I talked to a doctor who
recommended Sunny Palace. He said it was a great option for young
drug abusers. I decided that the palace was the best option for
me because the therapists, unlike my parents, weren't easily won
over by adulation. No form of benevolence could allow the
therapists to look the other way when I misbehaved. The palace
offered me structure and discipline, something my life lacked.

So I abandoned my life of havoc and moved to Sunny Palace. It
isn't exactly a mental hospital, but there are patients here who
suffer permanent cephalalgia because of the voices in their
heads, patients who talk to themselves, and people who, like me,
are drug abusers. I valiantly left behind a "good" life to join a
place where everyone had issues.

By the end of my fifth month here at the palace, drugs no
longer stymied my growth into a happy person. The therapists were
kind and examined my brain overtly as not to scare me away, and I
like that. They allowed me the chance to talk with them and
express my emotions, unlike my parent's, who brushed me off for
some business meeting or lunch at the country club.

And now, as I have said, it is my ninth month here, and I've
shed my old skin. I imbibed all the therapists here told me, and
everything I learned, to creat a new sking for myself. I purified
my mind and heart in the past nine months, and applied all that I
learned here at the Sunny Palace to my life. My parents were
always so mercenary, only worried about work, and how many tosy
they bought in, that they had no time for me. I took it as
rejection and turned to drugs to pacify the hurt and pain, and
the loneliness. But drugs weren't the answer. Attention and a
listening ear were the true antidotes.

A million chances at starting over slipped through my withered
hands before I came to Sunny Palace. Everytime I called out for
help, there was no one to listen, not at home anyways. But here
at the palace, everyone listened, and even some people could
relate.

By admitting myself to Sunny Palace and leaving the old behind
me, I created a new Zola. A new me, who learned the hard way that
death; is neither a comforter nor solution to any problems faced.
Sometimes it takes seperating yourself from the pain, and a
little Sunny Palace up on a hill to ease the pain and give a new
beginning at everything life messed over.